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Dessert

Mince Meat for Christmas Pies

A mixture of chopped meat, suet, apples, molasses, sugar, spices, vinegar, and broth used as filling for mince pies.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Nutmeg and cinnamon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 11,917 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Mince Meat for Christmas Pies

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the meat

  1. Boil the meat and let it cool in the broth before chopping.

Cook the mincemeat

  1. Add the broth and all other ingredients to the chopped meat.

  2. Boil the mixture for 1 hour.

  3. Pour into jars and store until needed.

Use in pie

  1. To make a mince pie, use this mixture in place of sliced apples in an apple pie.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Nutmeg + cinnamontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together11,917 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Cinnamon + allspicetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,536 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  3. Nutmeg + allspicetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,331 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  4. Apple + cinnamontop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,598 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyl cinnamate (strawberry).

  5. Sugar + cinnamontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together30,779 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

Sugar and cinnamon barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 30,779 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Chopped meat
Provides the savoury, bulky base of the mincemeat.
Suet
Adds richness and a soft, moist texture as it melts during cooking.
Chopped apple
Supplies moisture and body to the filling.
Molasses
Adds dark sweetness and a deep, rich flavour.
Sugar
Sweetens the mixture and helps preserve it.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that brightens the flavour and helps keep the mixture.

Swap the apple

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (meat, molasses, sugar, nutmeg, vinegar, cinnamon, allspice):

  1. Raisinfits better
  2. Figfits better
  3. Orangefits better
  4. Applethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against meat, molasses, sugar, nutmeg, vinegar, cinnamon, allspice. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

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